


Walkabout

by eretria



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Comfort/Angst, England (Country), Gen, Platonic Cuddling, Platonic Female/Male Relationships, Platonic Soulmates, Roadtrip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-30
Updated: 2013-06-30
Packaged: 2017-12-16 15:54:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/863842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eretria/pseuds/eretria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Secluded at the coven in England, Willow receives a visitor she doesn't expect. He's got the keys to a car and a plan for a road trip. It will not end the way either of them predict when they start it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Walkabout

**Author's Note:**

> I missed the more intense season 1& 2 friendship Willow and Xander shared. Which is why this story is theirs and only theirs. It doesn't quite tie into the canon events, but suspend your disbelief for a moment and pretend that it's a missing scene before Willow's vision of the Hellmouth. Well, missing scenes, really.
> 
> My deepest gratitude goes out to my beta-readers, [Auburn](http://archiveofourown.org/users/auburn), [murron](http://archiveofourown.org/users/murron) and Bimo who made this story so much better and asked the difficult, right questions.

  
_The church-bells rang, and the children recognised the high towers, and the large town; it was that in which they dwelt. They entered and hastened up to their grandmother's room, where everything was standing as formerly. The clock said "tick! tack!" and the finger moved round; but as they entered, they remarked that they were now grown up._  
[…]  
 _There sat the two grown-up persons; grown-up, and yet children; children at least in heart._

_\-- Hans Christian Andersen – The Snow Queen --_

***

_I begin to see an object when I cease to understand it.  
\-- Henry David Thoreau -- _

*  


The afternoon is grey and drizzly as Willow walks back to the Coven’s main building. The air smells of damp earth and freshly cut grass and the dark, pink hydrangeas near the entrance gate glisten wet.

It’s quiet. Few people enjoy the extended walks Willow likes to take in this kind of weather. She has wondered about that and has come to the conclusion that it might have something to do with growing up in Sunnydale, where rainy days were rare and the fresh green smell she finds here in England all the time was just present for about two weeks in spring before everything was brow-beaten by the relentless sun.

She feels closer to the earth out here, more connected in this place where there’s very little concrete and green as far as the eye can see.

England feels older. More connected to an older knowledge as well. It’s serene, less rushed than California and she wonders if she could find her equilibrium here just by listening to the earth and learning for a couple of years.

She’s better now than she was before, but she’s not well yet. The other witches know it. Giles knows it, too, sees it when he comes to visit. He never says anything, but she reads it in every frown, every worried look. She knows he doesn't trust her. Maybe he never will again and that harsh knowledge hurts her more than she can put into words. 

Willow wraps her arms around her midsection to quell the sudden ache in her belly. Giles doesn't trust her. The others – Buffy, Dawn, even Anya, and yes, she's sure even Xander – don't and can't trust her anymore. 

Maybe she should stay at the coven. Treat it as her prison where the jailers know how to subdue her and none of her friends can get hurt. 

The grey afternoon feels oppressive suddenly, and the damp earth smells of mold and she feels invisible walls closing around her.

The sound of a car approaching on the gravel road distracts before she can work herself into a panic attack and she peers around the corner of the house just to keep up the distraction.

It’s a new car, black, sleek, not really made for the bumpy dirt road leading up to the coven.

She watches as the driver pulls up near the entrance, kills the engine and gets out with a groan and starts stretching. He has his back to her but she can see that he’s tall, broad-shouldered and solid-looking. Hair so dark it’s almost black, curling over his ears where it has grown out of a regular cut. Something in her stomach pulls tight at the familiar, slightly goofy way he’s moving. He hasn’t turned far enough so she can see his face, but the set of the shoulders, the stance, the entire body-language screams familiarity.

When he does turn, she just sees his profile, but it’s enough.

Willow blinks. Once, twice. What she sees isn’t possible. He’s three thousand miles away. He can’t be here. No matter how much she has wished to see a familiar face in the past weeks.

She pinches herself on her lower arm and sharp pain flares against her skin. 

"Xander?"

He flinches and turns toward her voice. A practised smile flashes over his face but even from the distance she can see that it doesn't quite reach his eyes. He walks toward her, giving her a little wave. "Willow. Hey. Hi."

"Hi," she says when he's reached her. It's a question as much as it's a greeting because she still can't believe that her eyes aren't deceiving her.

"Looking good," he comments, encompassing her entire body with a wave of his hand. "Loving the," he gestures toward her hoodie, "comfy chic. Glad to see you didn't go all plaid and tweed on us." 

The humour is forced but she smiles anyway. He's here and he's making the same silly old jokes. Her rock in the sea. The man who saved the world. Her best friend. Tall and dishevelled, with those eyes that had held the truth even when she couldn't believe his voice, with those shoulders she cried against after everything was said and done and with those arms that had held her and hadn't let go. Xander. Her mind is so caught up in remembering that she's surprised she finds the words to answer him in kind. "Giles would have thought I was mocking him."

"And you wouldn't want to mock Giles," Xander agrees. "Not these days." He winces as soon as the words are out and Willow finds that she can't look at him any longer. What he doesn't say hangs heavy in the air – all the concern and the sharp worry that she might not be on the mend and that she needs to be locked away. Maybe that's why Xander came here. Maybe he just wants to check if everyone is safe from her. The nauseating thing is that she can't even blame him. She might do the same if roles were reversed. 

She lets her gaze stray from his face to the car behind him; the slope of his shoulder blurs as she focuses on the rain on the windshield.

"How is he doing, anyway?" Xander asks and she hears the plea in his voice.

"He's at home, so he's doing well." It's not much of an answer, but at least she's making conversation when really all she wants to do is run.

"Drinking tea and reading?"

"Or at the pub and singing."

Xander shudders. "Don't remind me. I'm still not over that shock."

They fall silent again and Xander taps his fingertips against his leg in a rapid, nervous staccato.

Willow sighs and decides to be the grown up and face her fear. "Xander, the elephant in the room is getting bigger by the second. Any time now, it's going to squish us both."

Xander grimaces. "Pesky elephant. He should think about joining Weight Watchers."

"Xander." She loves and hates him for evading her at the same time. She doesn't want to have him confirm what she fears. A part of her wants him to keep evading her and to tell her that everything's fine and he just wants to see her. But the realistic part of her can't stand dancing around what she knows is the issue any longer.

"What?" He looks caught red-handed.

"What are you doing here?" Willow asks, surprised at how calm and resigned she sounds.

Xander sticks out his bottom lip for a split second, then gestures toward the garden. "I felt like vacationing."

"Here."

He squares his shoulders. "I can take a vacation, can't I?"

"A vacation that conveniently takes you to England," she says, allowing her disbelief to colour her words. "Which has never been on your list of places to visit before."

Xander shrugs. "I like broadening my horizons. Culture. Yay!"

Willow sighs. He's always been stubborn and quite obviously he doesn't want to talk about why he's here. Maybe another approach will work. "Well, what about the others?" she asks. She knows that he can read between the lines that she's asking about Anya in particular. "Do they know –“

Xander shakes his head. "No. I told them I was contracted to work on a military construction site where everything was on a need-to-know basis. Told them I’d be out of touch for two weeks. No cellphones, no e-mail, not even a pigeon allowed."

"And they believed you?"

"Hey," he gestures toward his face. "This face? Is a poker face." He looks as though he’s waiting for her to applaud him.

"You lied to them," Willow bursts out.

Xander’s face falls. "Thanks for putting it so crassly."

"It’s true, though, isn’t it?"

He drops his chin to his chest and runs a hand over his head, making several unwashed strands stand up on end. She notices how rumpled he looks. Tired, too.

"Did you come here straight from the airport?" she asks, taking in his creased shirt and the jeans with what looks like a grease stain – probably from one of the salad dressing packages on the plane – on them. He has dark rings under his eyes.

"Weird driving experience and all," Xander answers. "And let me tell you, the coffee at that gas – oh, sorry, _petrol_ station – really sucked." He raises his head again to give her a hopeful look. "Tell me there’s decent coffee to be found here somewhere?"

Her mind is stuck, though. "You came here straight from the airport? Why?"

"I figured accommodation would be cheaper outside of London."

It’s another evasion. She’s had too many years of experience of seeing through them. With that experience backing her, it only takes one pointed look at the right moment to make his mask crumble.

It takes him a couple of minutes to stop looking at the hydrangeas. "I had to see you," Xander admits finally, his voice a near whisper.

Her heart skips a beat, then hammers against her chest forcefully. "Why?"

Xander's gaze snaps to her face, open and shocked. "Seriously, Will?" 

The look he gives her is so incredulous that it rubs her wrong immediately, makes all her insecurities flare up at once. She's been right. She's been right in what she thought earlier. 

For some reason, that sparks a hot surge of anger. "Yeah. Seriously. What, are you checking up on me?" She opens her arms wide. "Look at me." She turns in front of him like a model, albeit one vibrating with anger. The earth around her responds and a cold gust of wind ruffles their hair and clothes. "No black hair, no black eyes, no veins, no killing people or urges to destroy the earth, I’m all better, no need to fear the evil witch –“

"Willow, shut up."

Much to her own surprise, she snaps her mouth shut.

"You want to know why I’m here?"

"I thought I said that earlier."

A self-effacing grin flashes over his face, there and gone again in less than a second. "You did, didn’t you."

"I did."

"You did."

He stands in front of her and rubs a hand over the back of his neck again, clearly unsure of how to go on. It takes him a couple of tries and Willow wonders if he thought their meeting through even once before he stepped on the plane. 

Eventually, Xander reaches out and takes her balled hand in his, running his thumb over her knuckles. His hand is large enough it nearly engulfs her fist. She feels the nicks and calluses that come from carpenter's work. "I had to see you."

"Why?"

"No reason."

"Xander."

"I just … I don’t want to overanalyze this, Will." He’s rubbing circles on the back of her hand now; hectic, leaving warmth in its wake. "I wanted to ask you if you –" He trails off again.

Willow feels her eyebrows knit, fearing something bad is going to come. "What?"

"If you’d be interested in a little roadtrip."

"A roadtrip," she echoes. This isn't what she expected. The normalcy of the question has her reeling.

"Yeah, you know," he gestures between them. "You, me, a car and a road and some cool destinations. A roadtrip." He shrugs and smiles a sheepish smile. "Originally, I had planned to get a silly hat and do a Miss Daisy’s chauffeur thing, but my plane arrived late and I had no time to pick one up at the souvenir shop."

A smile spreads over her face as she listens to him ramble.

"What?" he asks when he catches it.

"Really?" she asks. Faint hope begins to blossom inside of her that her assumptions may have been wrong after all. "A roadtrip?"

He nods and looks earnest. Of all the people she has ever met, only Xander manages that without it looking ridiculous. "Really. Just you and me. No one else." She sees the bad joke reflect on his face before he makes it. "It can be our dirty little secret. You know, me with the England thing and you with the driving around with a guy."

She turns toward the Coven’s entrance and thinks of all she has learned in the past months and all she has missed. She’s lead a solitary life, not socialising with any of the other witches - who are all afraid of her anyway. Giles’ presence has helped, but not enough. She's gained knowledge and control, but she's lonely. It's self-inflicted, sure, but she's lonely nevertheless. She’s _tired_ of being lonely. And she hadn’t had any time to spend with Xander after Giles whisked her off to the Coven. This might be her chance to make things right again. Their chance.

"Let’s go," she says and slips her hand fully into his.

The smile that spreads over his face makes the grey afternoon seem just a little bit brighter.

***

Willow gets the blessing for the trip from the head of the coven with a warm nod and an "That's a brilliant idea, do go, just make sure to come back." After she had readied half a dozen explanations and justifications and strategies, she's still a little dazed by how easy it was when she throws her duffel bag in the backseat of the rental car.

Xander, in full entertainer mode, calls it their magical mystery tour and cheerily starts it out with a trip to Stonehenge.

Which, as it turns out, is a tourist trap catastrophe. They can't even get near the stones and the visitor's center along with the sounds from the street right next to the monument kills any mystical mood. They fall into mocking the new age people and nearly double over laughing when an earnest looking German guy unpacks a long grey cloak and a white beard and starts to chant, complete with large theatrical gestures, from behind the barrier to the awe of his fellow travellers.

"Who do you think he's trying to be, Gandalf or Merlin?" Xander asks in a stage whisper.

"The chanting sounds like Quenya," Willow wheezes out between giggle fits. "But the way he's moving, he could be Rasputin."

They mock and laugh and she enjoys the easy way they fall back into old habits.

"There's no magic here, anyway," she says when they finally can walk again without having to hold their bellies from laughing so hard. "Too many tourists."

Xander squints at her. "There never was any here?" He sounds a little shocked.

She keeps a straight face for a little while, then cracks a grin. "There was. There is. But it's nowhere near as powerful as people like to make it sound. This place was more of a glorified observatory."

"Which you knew," Xander states. His shoulders sink as he speaks.

"I did."

"Then why didn't you –"

"I always wanted to see it," she says, "and I know you did, too."

Xander perks up a little. "Okay, now that we _have_ seen it," he says with a look at the giggling Korean tourists snapping pictures in dramatic K-pop poses, "how about we try to wash away the cheap taste it's left in my mouth with some fine examples of British cooking?" The air quotes are audible even without him making them.

"Pub?" she asks.

"Pub," he answers.

***

The Malet Arms is the town's only pub and find it comfortable and homely. Dark beams shore the low-hanging ceiling, the walls are lined with dark wooden furniture that looks lived in and comfortable and the walls are littered with pictures from what appears to be the owners hobby – deerstalkings.

Xander utters his surprise at the eclectic mix of dishes - Mediterranean, Oriental and traditional English - on the menu and Willow rolls her eyes. Giles has taken her to a couple of pubs in the past and she has learned that the American prejudice against British pubs really needs to die a slow death.

Xander scans the menu. It gives her the chance to look at him. She sees frown lines on his forehead that she can't remember noticing before. A stray grey hair interrupts the solid black of his hair colour and she can't help but wonder if she caused that. If she pulled it out now, it wouldn't be there anymore. Not for a long while at least. All back to normal …

"What?" Xander asks. He wipes his hand over his forehead. "Do I have something on my face?"

She cracks a smile at the flare of his insecurity and she's tempted just to go on staring and making him squirm real good. She doesn't. Maybe later. "Nothing."

"You were staring."

"Was I?"

"You were."

"Maybe I was just contemplating how I'd still be into you if I weren't gay." She actually puts her tongue into her cheek.

"You were?" Xander looks honestly surprised and flattered before it dawns on him that she's having him on. He pulls a face. "Willow, everyone!" he exclaims to the empty pub. "Always with the weird and sneaky sense of humour." He returns her grin. "I missed that."

The barman returns from the back room and comes over to their table. "Ready to order?" he asks. He's wearing a black T-shirt and arms are covered in so many tattoos that Willow is too distracted by them to even look at his face.

"Most of the stuff on here sounds a little scary to me, so I'll go with the Steak Burger."

"Xander!" Willow swats his arm. "When in Rome …" She waggles her eyebrows at him.

Xander places the menu back on the table. "Would you like to order?" he asks, sounding resigned.

Willow wonders how many times Xander had that discussion with Anya and if the easy deference was a leftover from their relationship. It's … domesticated. She's not sure if she's amused by it or hates it.

"We'll take the cod and the game pie."

Xander picks up the menu again. "Mushy peas?" he reads, his voice incredulous. " _Mushy_ peas?"

"The cod has a beer batter."

"Did you really just order me the fancy version of fish and chips? And the alternative is _pie_?"

Willow nods with a wide and sunny grin. It feels good to tease him. "When in Rome."

Xander groans. "I'm going to need a drink."

***

"Okay, how about some place else? You know, some real thing, now that the cider has worn off and we're well-fed?"

Willow grins at him. "What do you have in mind?"

***

_"Never sing on a burial mound, for the Wights will hear you and come to take you into the deep."_

\-- Old saying

 

Dusk is already beginning to creep in when they reach the Neolithic burial mound called Wayland's Smithy. Xander hasn't told her where he planned on taking her next, he'd just waggled his eyebrows and said that it was a surprise. It's definitely a welcome change when compared to Stonehenge because there's no one here. They're completely alone. A cool wind ruffles the large beech trees in a gentle caress. On the ground, last year’s dry leaves rustle in the breeze and they pile up in front of the chamber’s entrance almost as if something is calling them.

The movement draws their gazes to the mound, the set up is impressive: the standing stones at the entrance loom large and forbidding, while farther ahead, the open mouth of the burial chamber yawns dark and mysterious, and the wind now brings the chill of the fast approaching evening. With the sun already dipped beyond the horizon, there’s little light to guide them.

Neither Willow nor Xander worry, though. They have spent so much time in cemeteries since they met Buffy that such places don't scare them any longer. Generally the knowledge of what lies beneath does that. It’s different here, though; there’s a strange and gentle calm about the place.

Willow sets foot on the small flight of steps leading up to the top of the mound, while below, Xander chatters in an excited tone about the skill and the knowledge that went into creating this place from the heavy Sarsen stones.

Now that she's up here, she sees that the beech trees surround the mound but leave open an unhindered view toward the sky from where she’s standing. 

She has the urge to see more of the sky than a quick glance and to feel the calm of the earth underneath her, so she sits down on the large slab of Sarsen stone, then reclines on it, just watching the darkening sky above her, fringed by the swaying beech trees.

She begins to hum under her breath, unthinking, a song she heard Tara sing in the shower sometimes. The melody wraps around her like a cocoon and in front of her inner eye, she can see Tara as she pokes her head out of the shower and smiles at her. 

Her throat closes at the memory and breaks the song. She’s never been a great singer, anyway, so maybe it is better if she stops before she embarrasses herself in front of Xander.

She closes her eyes and listens to Xander’s steps and occasional thrilled comment as he moves inside the mound, listens to the wind and the dry leaves and the last rustling of insects before the night falls completely – and freezes when, just at the edge of her hearing, the melody she hummed before is continued in a bell-like soprano voice.

Willow scrabbles up into a sitting position and looks around, expecting to find a woman singing.

There’s no one there.

The singing, however, continues. Eerie, ethereally perfect singing without a source. Shivers race over her arms and back and she stands, looking again.

Still no one. She’s alone. She's alone with the voice that keeps on singing, gentle and lulling.

And she can’t hear Xander anymore.

Oh, God.

"Xander?" 

No answer. Just more silence, pierced by the clear voice that's getting louder now. The calm atmosphere is gone, the earth feels hostile.

" _Xander_." They have to get away from here, something's not right at all. "Xander, where _are_ you?" her voice has taken on a panicked tone, she knows and doesn't care. 

In the near-darkness she can barely see the steps that lead down from the mound. She stumbles down and only catches herself by windmilling her arms madly.

" _Willow_."

That isn't Xander calling her. The voice she hears is female, multi-faceted, clear and dark, young and old and everything in between.

A trickle of cold sweat runs down Willow's back.

" _Willow_." A harsh whisper now.

She clamps both hands over her ears but finds that she can hear the voice inside her head now, echoing. " _Destroyerkillerwitchdemonmistressgoddess, **Willow**._ "

They need to get out of here, they need to get away _now_.

"Xander where the hell are you?" She doesn't shout, she screams.

She reaches the bottom of the mound, touches her hand against the entrance stone for support when she stumbles over a root. As her fingertips get in contact with the stone, the earth starts to scream around her. It’s ready to swallow her whole and so terribly alive that she feels as though she touched a live wire that connects her to the darkest magic, the kind she only felt when –

The force of the assault slams her to her knees, hard enough to break the skin even through her jeans.

She can’t breathe. It’s there, it’s all there, Warren’s flayed body, its inhuman scream – not his, not his, it's just a body, not a person, it can't be because it felt too good, Tara’s blood, her life seeping through Willow’s fingers, the rage that filled every fibre of her being, the _power_ , that terrible power that burned her from the inside out.

Only this time, Xander’s not here to save her. This time, it will consume her, it will eat her alive, leaving the world intact, just ridding it of an illness.

The earth opens up around her, cold and brutal arms pulling at her, welcoming her and the fire is back, it's inside her, licking, burning, killing. She kicks and claws against it but feels her strength weaken.

Maybe, she thinks as she sinks into the darkness, she deserves it. Maybe this is finally her punishment. Did she really think she could have done what she did without consequences?

Penance. Punishment.

Relief.

As long as nothing happens to Xander, she's actually all right with it.

She stops fighting and lets go, expecting hell.

***

There’s a small spark of light in the darkness. Tiny. Flickery. But it doesn’t go out.

***

Hell doesn't come.

She comes to and the first thing she hears is a frantic thump-thump noise that fills her entire being and resonates in her bones. Not her heartbeat. Somebody else's. One after another her other senses awaken , and she feels cold wind on her arms and damp earth underneath her. Her side is warm where it's pressed against another body and there are hands stroking her hair and face. Shaking hands.

For a delirious split-second, she thinks those hands might be Tara's, but they're too big and too rough. As her senses sharpen, she recognises they’re a carpenter's hands, worn by sandpaper and splinters.

Xander.

Even though every fibre of her being aches, she lifts her hand and covers Xander’s hand with hers, stilling the movement.

"Oh, thank God." His voice is a rough whisper that blends into the rustling of the beech trees above them.

He gathers her even closer than before, a desperate embrace, and she smells the sour sweat tang of fear radiating from his skin. It hurts, like he’s crushing her suddenly brittle bones but she doesn’t stop him.

"What happened, Will?" Xander murmurs after what feels like a small eternity. His breath disturbs her hair, warm and moist; a ward against the chill of the burial mound.

An excellent question. She’s not sure she can answer it. Earlier, she was ready to go into the dark, to face death. It just … didn’t happen. It’s as if the darkness spit her out again, like a mouldy pistachio in a bag full of tasty ones. It was unwilling to take her, despite the earlier lure.

She has no idea why. Except … maybe she just wasn’t ready. Maybe her essence isn’t as tarnished as she thought it was. She had told Giles two months ago that she just wanted to be Willow again.

So what if that was it? What if it wasn’t so much the darkness spitting her out as it was something in this place holding her back? Something not wanting her to go down that path? Something that resonated with the part of her that was Willow again and still? 

Willow shakes her head and buries her nose against his chest, breathing in the comforting blend of detergent, warm skin and soap that’s unique to Xander. She can't put what happened into words. Not yet. Not before she understands what happened.

"Let's just avoid barrows from now on. Please?"

His silence in reply tells her that this isn't over, but he picks her up, gathers her against his chest and carries her back to the car.

***

Xander decides to treat her to something special after the Wayland's Smithy incident and gets them a twin room at the Overton Manor in Wroughton which his guidebook praises for its excellent breakfast. The house brims with understated elegance and their room is beautifully _English_ without being over the top.

After sitting on their respective beds, unable to talk, they decide to have dinner at the recommended pub, the White Hart. It turns out to be a picturesque thatched two-story house with hanging baskets overflowing with purple, blue and vibrant pink petunias hanging on the front wall. They sit in the beer garden where they studiously ignore the next elephant in the room and eat fish and chips again. This time, Xander chooses it for them both. Willow thinks that it might be a bad idea to feed the elephant any more fat and starch, but the comforting taste of fried food makes her ignore her better senses.

Xander drinks a pint of dark ale from the local brewery and Willow gets tipsy on cider and she has no idea how they both manage to steer their conversation clear of any risky subject. 

Maybe it's the alcohol. Neither of them is used to pints, and Xander in particular isn't used to the higher alcohol content of the English ales, so they soon fall into tipsy giggling and retelling childhood tales that really shouldn't be funny enough to warrant their amount of laughter.

When she thinks about it, though, they’ve always been good at it. Years of experience have taught them when to talk and when to be silent or gloss over something they don’t or don’t want to understand. The post-danger laughter feels good. It feels normal. It’s been far too long since she felt normal.

***

She's still a little giggly and feels okay when they turn in but once it’s dark inside the room, she can’t get any sleep. The day's events replay in front of her mind's eye and her thoughts run circles of why, what, who, why. After an hour, she gets up, stands beside Xander’s bed, asks silently, without words.

Xander doesn’t comment, doesn’t ask. He just lifts the covers and scoots over to the far side, waits until she has crawled in and pulls her against him before draping the cover over her as well. It’s cramped and uncomfortable and he must be half-falling out of the narrow bed, but he doesn’t complain. Just holds her and strokes her hair until she falls asleep, lulled by his heartbeat.

It’s the comfort she’s needed ever since she came to England, the comfort she never dared to ask for.

***

Waking up, Willow feels , content in a way she hasn't been in months. The warmth of another body spooned around her makes her feel calm and she closes her eyes and enjoys those moments of half awareness in which her brain isn't up to speed yet and she can just feel.

 _Tara_ , she thinks and snuggles against her … only to notice something that definitely doesn't feel female. After an initial moment of panic, last night's events come back to her and she grins to herself. A couple of years back, she'd have given and arm and a leg to wake up in bed with Xander and have him respond to her.

She remembers Oz and how much fun morning sex had been with him. It wouldn’t be the same now, because sex with Tara had been a revelation, but she does remember.

If she did go back to playing for the other team, it'd be easy to initiate it now. Xander's a guy and she knows that a part of him will always be attracted to her, just the way a part of her will always be attracted to him. If she were still so inclined, she'd be stupid to say no. It would be perfect timing. And, according to one of Anya's many indiscretions, he wouldn't disappoint.

As it is, feeling Xander's morning erection just makes her a little wistful and a lot amused, because she now has material to tease him till the cows come home.

"Well," he rumbles against the back of her head. "This is awkward."

She has no idea how she manages to keep a straight face, but she does. "Want to tell you body that I'm gay?"

"I have ever since I woke up. It's not listening."

"When did you wake up?" she asks, because she could have sworn that he was still asleep until he started talking.

"Oh, about ten minutes or so."

She frowns. "That's when I woke up."

"I know."

"So?"

"I, ah … was hoping you'd have to go to the bathroom so I could jump out of the window in mortification."

"I could always turn around and breathe at you. I'm sure that'd be a turn off."

"Wouldn't change the mortification and besides, still a guy here, Wills."

"Not bothered by morning breath?"

"My penis doesn't have a nose."

"Xander!" she scrunches up her nose, but laughs and swats his arm.

"Feel like going to the bathroom now?" he asks when she has stopped laughing. "Because, I have to tell you, having you next to me, vibrating with laughter isn't really helping matters any." On cue, his dick twitches against her behind.

Willow can't help it, she can't stop sniggering over how ridiculous this whole situation is. " _Vibrating?_ "

Xander rolls to his back and covers his eyes with his forearm. "Just kill me. No, really, do." He lifts the arm and squints at her with one eye when she doesn't stop laughing. "Please?"

Willow turns around in bed so she's facing Xander. She schools her face into what she hopes is a neutral mask. "How about you go to the bathroom and," she gestures toward his crotch and, no, done, losing it again. She sniggers for a full minute before she can talk again. Even then, her voice is shaky with subdued laughter. "And take care of things."

Xander is still squinting at her from one eye. Only this time, it's the other. "Thank you for not saying 'plumbing' or I would have had to go into a carpenterish huff."

Willow points to the ensuite bathroom door. "Go, or I'll never stop laughing at you."

"You'll be out here. The walls are thin." He actually looks alarmed.

"You can always walk into the breakfast room with your little problem," she points out sweetly.

"Note how I am not making the ‘between a rock and a hard place’ pun that’s clearly in the air.” He gets out of bed and walks toward the bathroom with a certain stiffness to his movements. Willow falls back against the pillows, laughing until her stomach hurts. The sheets and the pillow smell of Xander. It's a good, comforting smell.

"Glad I can still make you laugh," Xander comments drily from the bathroom door.

"It's a talent," Willow answers and smirks at him.

Before he disappears into the bathroom, he rummages around in his duffel bag and throws his mp3 player on the bed with a soft plastic click-thump noise.

Willow gives him her best insolent smile and waves her hand at him to make him shut the door.

She leaves the room without touching the mp3 player once she hears the shower come on, though. All teasing aside, there are certain things best friends really don't need to share.

***

"So, how are things between you and Anya?" Willow asks on the fourth day. They're walking through the gigantic stone circle of Avebury on a day bright enough Xander wears shades and Willow has bought a hat at the gift shop. She feels the question is allowed now that Xander has seen her weak spots up close. What she doesn't expect is the way his face falls at the question and his entire body sort of crumples, like a balloon the air is let out of slowly.

Anybody else would have received a snarky reply. Not her. Not here. For her, he's not answering the question but she reads his body language like a book. It's bad; his brash charm and loud jokes only barely cover the turmoil and hurt that lie beneath.

Willow pulls him into the shade of one of the big sarsen stones and reaches for his glasses. He stills her hand en route. "Don't."

"You can talk to me." She doesn't add that they haven't really talked about it since Xander left Anya at the altar. Not one on one, never in depth. Then Tara happened and Willow drowned in her own world of pain and heartbreak and never had the time to ask how Xander was coping.

"I don't even know how to justify it to myself, so how can I talk about it?" He sounds tired, not upset.

"I have always been good at deciphering your brainwaves, haven't I?" she asks, colouring her words in hopeful naïveté.

A smile flickers over his face at her words. She can't tell if it reaches his eyes or not; they're still hidden behind the shades. He hasn't let go of her hand yet and rubs his thumb over her knuckles again. "That you were, Will, that you were."

His words cut into her with the unexpected precision of a sharp blade where the pain only hits you after you see the bleeding wound. "Past tense?"

Xander grasps her hand fully, nearly crushing it, and takes off the shades with the other. His eyes are bloodshot but earnest. In this moment, Willow knows that he sees her and only her. "Never past tense. Never, you hear me?"

"Even if we don't spend as much time together as we did when we were kids, you don't stop being my best friend. Hey, if anyone can figure out my brain, it's you. And who knows," he shrugs, "maybe we're just good at figuring each other out. After all, I got through that great big noggin' here," he taps the edge of his shades against her temple, "and that's no walk in the park."

"It really, really isn't," Willow agrees. She acts on impulse; hugs him and doesn't let go. "I never said thank you, did I?" she murmurs against his chest.

He pokes a finger against her shoulder. "And if you ever do, I'll –"

"Shush." She closes her arms tighter around his ribcage. "Just accept it."

Xander stands very still for a long minute. Then he wraps his arms around her and leans against the stone. They stand that way until their breathing is synchronised.

***

They have tea and scones at a café in Highworth, about 20 miles from the Uffington White Horse, and Xander falls in love with them so completely he promptly overeats. Willow laughs at him when he holds his stomach on the way back to their B&B and claims to want to pay Giles back for never mentioning scones and clotted cream to him. Just as soon as he can move again.

Which he doesn’t. Not that afternoon. Not that evening. They sit in the B&B’s lush garden between roses in full bloom and lavender bushes lining the paths, listening to birdsong, feeling the gentle breeze on their faces, heavy with the sweet scent of the roses and the sharp freshness of the lavender. Xander wraps an arm around her waist and pulls her closer and Willow follows; she rests her head on his shoulder and listens to the sounds around them. Bees buzzing last rounds before they return to their hive for the night. The wind whispering through the poplar leaves on the far side of the garden. Churchbells in the distance. The moo of a sleepy cow.

Xander’s breathing, his heartbeat.

Willow turns her face so her nose rests against Xander’s collarbone and moves her hand to place it over his heart.

She can feel it beating. A little erratic, but strong. Alive. Warm.

When his hand covers hers, she opens her eyes to see that her fingers have dug into his chest and she relaxes them one by one, rubbing fingertips over places where her nails must have left marks.

"I’m here, Will. I’m not going anywhere."

Her sixteen year old self would have doubted it, would have asked for confirmation but would have ultimately believed him. Her post-Tara self knows that it’s a promise he can’t keep. Not forever.

"As long as I can," he murmurs and presses a kiss against the top of her head.

She closes her eyes again and drifts.

***

They stop asking for a twin room after Wayland's Smithy.

She curls into him and he wraps around her and it’s the way it was when they were children, before the Slayer stepped into their lives. Closeness, understanding, a feeling of absolute safety.

Willow longs to be that child again. Carefree and unburdened. Even though she knows it can never be, she burrows into Xander's warmth and enjoys this time while it lasts.

***

Glastonbury. Of all the places they’ve visited, Xander couldn’t have picked a more clichéd one.

Then again, he did have Stonehenge on his schedule, so maybe she shouldn't be surprised.

They park the car at the bottom of the hill and walk up the winding path slowly. Xander is talking; a calm ripple of words she doesn’t even try to follow. The sound of his voice is steady and reassuring.

This is the fifth mystical place on their little journey and Willow remembers how in the beginning, she thought she was being tested.

But that had been in the beginning. A week in, she has begun to wonder if it isn’t the other way around, if he’s trying to make amends by taking her places he thinks she wants to see or might be good for her.

She doesn’t have the heart to explain that he doesn't have to do any of it, and that she's not really interested in the places, but just in being with him. It doesn't matter, anyway. The outcome is the same.

So she just goes along and soaks up the quiet joy that always comes from spending time with Xander. No matter how much time has passed, no matter what happens between them; through all the ups and downs of their friendship, this part has always survived.

She’s happy with him, she realises. Not in-love or in-lust happy, just simply happy in a way she hasn't been in far too long. He knows her and accepts her and she does the same. They don't need anything in between.

The climb is slow and steady, the path winds around the Tor. Just like it was during their visit at Wayland's Smithy, the sun is beginning to set. As she looks out over the landscape surrounding them, she sees mist pooling in the little valleys. No, not mist, clouds. Fast-forming clouds that herald a coming storm. Gentle evening light makes them appear like lakes of tangerine and laburnum-like yellow, spilling over and growing until they’re combined into a sea of fire and gold that hides all the signs of civilisation. 

Xander has fallen silent and has stopped walking; together they watch the sun paint the clouds in even more vibrant colours by the minute in one last attempt to show its strength before it succumbs to the night. A flock of birds rises up from a tree that still pokes its head out over the cloud-cover; their cries are eerie in the silence of this sacred hill.

He reaches for her hand when the colours have faded and they walk up the rest of the path up to the tower atop the Tor in comfortable silence.

All alone up there, the medieval tower is austere in its beauty; it reminds her of an oversized version of the tower in Giles' chess set. Her admiration turns into a slight hollow feeling in her stomach when she remembers reading that there used to be a church attached to it and the tower is now all that is left. The church was scrapped for stones. She's not overly religious, and never was Christian to begin with, but it used to be a holy place and damaging it reeks of sacrilege. With the thought of the church in mind, the tower looks a bit like a statue of which only the torso is left, no head, no arms, no legs. She wonders if the tower feels the loss of the church like phantom pain.

The tower's outside walls, made of limestone that is tinted in a cool, forbidding grey now the sun has set, are covered in lichen. A narrow gate allows the visitor a gothic frame for view of the landscape behind it. She spots a flash of white and lets go of Xander's hand to investigate. When she has rounded the tower, she sees a woman dressed all in new-age, flowing white disappear down the winding path they had climbed up. The mist swallows her within seconds.

They're alone up here now, Willow realises. No other soul in sight and a potential rainstorm approaching. It should make her nervous, she thinks, but it doesn't. She knows she's safe up here. Safe now that she's made her peace with both the magic and herself. She's just pretty sure that Xander won't feel the same, so she turns back to find him.

He's sitting on the narrow bench inside the tower, a shadow among shadows. “I think it’s already raining down there,” Xander says, looking out the doorway. His voice echoes in the height of the tower. “Nice to know that some clichés still hold true. Doesn’t all that rain make you miss California?”

She doesn’t answer. Instead, she looks at the mist covering the landscape around her, hears the earth whisper to her in a dark but warm welcome and she embraces a knowledge she's carried inside her for some time now but never dared to face.

"So, when you're back, I think we should –"

Willow stops him in mid-sentence by placing both her hands on his cheeks and rising up to kiss him. It's sweet, his lips soft, they're immobile but warming under hers. She doesn't taste him, the kiss isn't about that. It is supposed to be nothing more than a quick, tender peck, but she lingers, revelling in the simple warm touch of their lips, wanting to relive the memory of every connection they once shared, including this one, and wanting to make a new one she can lock away inside of her when it's all over. When she has done what she will do next.

"I'm not coming back, Xander," she murmurs when she pulls back. Her words are nearly drowned by the sound of the rain that's beginning to fall outside of the tower.

Xander goes perfectly still and even stops breathing for what feels like a small eternity. Then he covers her hands with his, holds her in place. "What?" he asks, his voice uneven and disbelieving. His eyes, slipped shut during their kiss, stay closed.

"I'm not coming back," she repeats and runs the pad of her thumb over his chin and to his mouth where his lower lip trembles the way it always does when he's confused and upset. A raw wave of pain rolls over her when she realises once more just how well she knows him, every single bit of him.

"I heard you the first time, I'm just having trouble comprehending." He opens his eyes and searches her face, her eyes. "How do you mean you're not coming back? Not now? Not ever?" His voice breaks on the last syllable.

Willow squares her shoulders and meets his gaze. It's a gargantuan effort. "Not ever."

Xander drops his hands and takes a step back so her hands fall from his face as well. He opens and closes his mouth a few times but no sound comes out. His eyes are wide, shocked and so hurt that Willow wants to take her words back even as she knows she can't. 

"You said that before," he rasps eventually and she's propelled back to the Highway, to Buffy and Xander trying to hold her back from killing Warren. She tastes the dust on the back of her tongue, the thirst for revenge and it takes all her willpower to push back the craving for the dark magic that still lingers inside of her.

That memory gives her the strength to stand her ground. She's not ready to return. She might never be. Oddly enough, the knowledge doesn't hurt. "I mean it this time."

"Why?" Xander asks. His voice is small.

"I belong here." Willow is surprised how easy those words come over her lips, and how she knows they're the truth even if she has never acknowledged it before. 

"Bullshit." The word is like the crack of a whip. It moves the hair that has fallen into her face but she remains still, ready to let whatever is coming next wash over her. 

She smells the rain and the damp earth and feels grounded. "I do. I belong here."

"You belong here as much as a snowman belongs in a furnace." Xander's smile is forced, desperate. It's a mask for the anger that is swirling just under the surface and that he's holding back on. "Will, this is crazy. You can't be serious."

"I am."

"How? How can you be serious? There is nothing here for you. This land tried to kill you earlier this week, remember?" He gestures toward the archway beyond which the rain is now falling steadily, obscuring the landscape around them. "Or is this some rain-related amnesia?"

"Xander, don't." She knows what's to come but she's too at peace with her decision to want a big emotional blow out about it. It's all right. She just needs him to see that it's all right. It's the best choice for her, the best for all of them. 

"Don't what?"

"Just don't."

"Don't what, Will?" he demands and there it is, the spark of anger she'd been hoping to avoid. "Don't speak my mind? Why, are you suddenly afraid of it?"

"I'm not afraid of you, Xander." She isn't. This is her choice, and no matter what he says, it won't change her mind. The earth's energy on the Tor bolsters her confidence and shields her from the negativity that's beginning to seep from Xander toward her. 

Wind comes up outside and buffets the rain against the tower.

"Maybe you should be."

She cocks her head to the side, narrowing her eyes. The sun has set outside and it's getting harder to see his face in the shadows. "Is that really what you want? Is that where you want this conversation to go?"

Xander shoves both hands into his hair and fists them there. Willow winces when he pulls several hairs out by the root. "No, I don't. But I'm tired of shutting up and going with the flow." 

He waits for her to reply. When she doesn't, it only appears to fuel his anger. "I’ve shut up too much in the past, I’ve just looked on and bit my tongue because I didn't want to hurt your feelings, but you know what? I'm over that. I'm so done with watching out for everyone's delicate sensibilites while they trample on mine." He removes his hands from his head and thumps his fist against the wall next to him.

Willow listens but doesn't reply, partly because she knows it's better to let him rant when he's in rant-mode and partly because she feels he's reached a point where it just needs to get out.

"I know, I know," he continues with big, sweeping gestures toward himself, "big, broad-shouldered Xander can take it, the weight of everyone's problems and being left behind and the odd insult, right, he's the funny guy, he will make a joke about it and just take it in stride and it won't hurt him because he's just a dumb carpenter and bricklayer who won't understand the insult you just threw at him anyway, right? Just the village idiot you can treat like crap and he'll laugh it away and be your friend and your stepping stone and all will be good because, look, Xander's always there."

Some of his words echo in the high ceiling of the tower, others are ripped away by the tempest getting stronger outside. The sky has decided to join Xander's dark mood and throw a storm at them. 

Willow is surprised to find that his words don't make her angry. None of the defensiveness she still would have felt a year or so ago rises up. Instead, she just feels helpless, has no idea how to help him. She wants to make it better so badly it's a physical pull, a knot in her stomach.

"Have you ever wondered if this is really all that easy for me?" He turns around to face her. "Have you ever thought about me? How this is affecting me? Have you ever wondered if I might get all the veiled insults and the jokes on my expense and if they hurt me? Because they do, Willow. They do. I bleed when you prick me."

It's not fair and she knows he's better than that and that he's smarter than he lets on, but she's still surprised that he quotes the _Merchant of Venice_. Of all the things. She tries to hide her reaction, is ashamed of herself for being just as snobbish as everyone else is, so ashamed, but it's too late.

"Surprises you, doesn't it?" His tone cuts like a knife, bitter and angry. Her cheeks begin to burn in embarrassment. She wants to look away from him but forces herself not to. He gives her a look of disgust mingled with hurt and resignation, then steps outside the tower and raises his face up to the rain. "God, why did I kid myself. Of all people, I thought that at least _you_ wouldn't take it for granted that I'm just a dumb oaf, but hey. Look at that. You do. You probably always did."

Willow can't breathe, she’s reeling from the truth. His words are like needles. Precise, poisoned needles cutting into her heart and she deserves every single one of them. She reaches out a hand and steps out of the tower that protected them both from the lashing rain. The sudden bitter cold wetness soaking her cardigan is a shock she registers but ignores. "Xander –"

"Don't try," he snarls. "Don't make this any cheaper by telling me that you care about me and that it all just came out wrong."

Willow tries to unlock her jaw to reply but can’t find the strength to. Her scalp prickles despite the rain matting her hair to her skull and her heart races, fast enough to make her nauseous. A gust of wind rocks her against the rough stones of the tower and rips the warmth from her body. He's right. He is. She slings her arms around herself against the cold. He's right in his accusations, no matter how much they hurt her and no matter how over the top they might be because of his anger. She didn't know how much he missed her, most of all because she didn't think he would miss her at all after everything that had happened. She has thought of it, of what would happen if she lost their friendship. But always in selfish terms, how it would affect her, not how it would affect Xander. 

His pain and his angry words are based on truth and that truth hurts her as much as it hurts him because it shows her just how much she has neglected their friendship. She cares about him. She cares about him so much more than she can ever put into words. Now everything she thought they rebuilt in the last week is falling away from her and she feels like the dancer on a wire when the wire disappears beneath her feet. She's falling, plummeting.

Xander wipes wet hair from his eyes. "I know my problems are small compared to yours. I'm neither a Slayer nor a witch nor a demon nor a chosen one nor a Key nor a frigging Vampire." The cynicism rolls off him in waves, just like the scent of wet wool from his soaked jacket. " _I_ don't know the deep emotions. _I_ haven't lost the love of my life, _I_ don't know what it feels like, right?' He angles his body away from her and opens his arms in a mock-inviting gesture. "I'm just good old Xander, the butt of everyone's jokes. You need to have suffered true loss before you become part of the gang and, hey, what have I lost, right?" 

Willow sucks in a sharp breath to fight an instinctive snarl and squares her shoulders. If there is one thing Xander has always been good at that no one ever told him, it is finding the right words to salt the earth around him in a big way when he's angry and hurt. He could inflict major damage without intending to. Subconsciously going for the jugular. This time, she wonders if he did intend to. The reminder of Tara in this hurts like a knife to the chest and Willow has a hard time accepting that Xander is just angry and just lashing out and that he isn't trying to cheapen her loss. "Anya is alive," she replies, as calm as she can manage.

"Alive?" Xander echoes and whips around to face her. She can barely make out his eyes in the falling darkness, but she can feel the heat of his gaze. "Newsflash for you, sweetheart: I have lost just as much as you have. The love of _my_ life may not be dead, but she's lost to me. She doesn't know if she prefers me dead or alive so she can inflict major damage on me. And you know what? I can't even blame anyone for losing her. I have no one to kill for the pain this is causing, I can't seek revenge, because it's all my own fault." He deflates a little and runs a hand through his hair, making it cling to his skull. "I know that none of you ever believed in us. You all just saw the odd couple consisting of the uneducated clown who finally got a steady job and the strange-talking ex-demon, and look, aren't they adorable? But you know what? I love her. With every fibre of my being."

"I know." Willow does. She never really understood it, never got Xander and Anya's relationship, but it was clear even to a blind and deaf person that Xander loved her. That knowledge and the admission of how much Xander still hurts mellows some of her earlier anger.

"You _know_ ," Xander repeats, his tone derisive. "Because you know me so well."

"After all those years, I'd like to think so, yes," she answers carefully because all of a sudden, what she believes she knows stands on feet of very fragile clay. The rain has soaked her clothes right down to her skin by now and she shivers but she tries to get close to him anyway, disregarding her own discomfort. "Xander, what's –"

He crosses his arms over his chest, physically blocking her attempt at getting through to him. "If you know me so well, would you like to tell me why you telling me you're not coming back makes me angry?"

"No more free downloads of cable TV shows?" she jokes, trying to lighten the mood. Her fingers curl into fists tight enough to make her knuckles crack. Jokes have always worked before, right? Pulled Xander out of his funks? It's going to work again. It has to work again.

The attempt fails; Xander doesn't even crack a smile. "I saved your life, Willow. I saved the world by stopping you from going over that edge. And I stand by it, I don't want a thank you for that. I would do it again in a heartbeat. Not because it would save the world. Because it would save _you_."

Willow lets her hands fall to her side, limp. He would. It's not just an empty phrase. Xander will always be there for her, no holds barred, no regard for his own safety. Even when she leaves him behind, he'll never stop loving her. He's not going to leave her, her fears are entirely unfounded, she begins to realise. It makes his resignation and his next words feel like an all the harsher kick to the gut.

"This bombshell you delivered today just makes one thing very clear to me: no matter what I do, no matter how hard I work and what I offer, it's never enough, is it?" He raises his hands and looks at them as if he's seeing them for the first time and finds them severely lacking strength. The fight has gone out of him. The fuel his anger ran on is depleted and he's faltering now. 

Willow doesn't know what's worse, his anger or his resignation. Seeing it makes her throat tighten and feel like it's filled with hot lead.

"It's just never enough. In the end, my life's just not as important as all of yours are." 

Willow wants to stop him, tell him he's wrong, so very, very wrong, that she went over the edge when Tara died but that no one, not even Tara, could have stopped her from destroying the world if it had been Xander who'd died in her arms, but she's rooted to the spot with too many words in her mind for her tongue to form and her mouth to spill. Words that rip her chest and throat apart wanting to get out. Words of comfort. Apologies.

When she doesn't speak up, Xander's face undergoes a contortion that ends with bitter cynicism. "I know that my feelings don't matter," he says, calm in a way he hadn't been before. It's worse than his rage. It's acceptance and Willow hates every second of it. "I'm just a means to an end, to be discarded when used."

"Xander, no." She hears how pleading her own voice sounds and doesn't care. She wants to plead. She needs to plead, to make him understand that he couldn't be more wrong. But the words once again don't come. In her despair, she reaches out to touch him to make him understand but he shies away from her hand again.

It feels like a slap to the face. Her hand drops, useless. A gust of wind hits her and leeches what warmth is left from her body. Willow has never felt so cold in her entire life. A scream is building in her throat, but it's selfish to think about how much seeing Xander hurt is hurting her. She can't – He doesn't need – She wraps her arms around herself, trying to quell the pain radiating from her middle. Tears burn in her eyes.

Xander looks at her, then away and shakes his head as though he wants to clear it. He sways on the spot, rocked by the buffeting wind.

"I'm tired of it, Willow," he says. His voice is no more than a whisper now; she has to strain her ears to hear what he's saying. "So tired." He takes a few steps around the tower and into the shadow of the wind where he sits down with his knees against his chest and his back against the ancient, lichen and moss-spotted stones. Rain runs from his hair into his eyes. He shivers but doesn't move away from her when she crouches next to him into the squelching mud and rests a shaking hand on his knee. "Just for once, I want to be the one who is cared about for himself. Not because I'm the clown who makes everyone laugh, not because of the money I bring home, or the stupid stamina I have in bed, or the help I offer, no matter how little it is. Just for me."

He doesn't know. It hits her with the force of a cartoon anvil: he doesn't know that she still loves him. He thinks that somewhere along the way, she stopped.

It takes her three tries to press sounds through the tightness of her throat. "I'm sorry, Xander," she says. Tears threaten to choke her. "I'm so, so sorry."

When he doesn't react, Willow nudges Xander's knees aside and kneels just at his side, close enough so she can shield him from the elements. Close enough to pull him against her, away from the cold stone wall and against her. She smells wet wool from his jacket, folds her arms around his stiffening shoulders and stays that way until she feels him exhale and melt against her, boneless. 

She doesn't want to have to put into words what she's feeling, but she knows that he needs it. "I never stopped, Xander. I may not be _in love_ with you anymore, but I still love you. Maybe now more than ever. I'm so proud of all you have accomplished, all on your own." She rubs her hand up and down his back.

"I don't love you because you were my anchor on Kingman's Bluff, Xander," she murmurs against his wet hair. "Not because you make me laugh. Not because of your skills or your big heart. You've always been my anchor because of who and what you are. Always will be."

She guides his face against her chest with a gentle nudge then. His breath comes in uneven hitches and she closes her eyes and wills him to breathe with her, calm and steady.

"You matter to me, Xander," she whispers against his hair. Her throat is tight, she has to force the words out. "Your feelings matter. I’m sorry I didn’t listen, I’m so sorry I wasn’t there for you when you were in pain. Never again, okay? "

Willow strokes his hair for what seems like hours long after the rain ends, just like he did on Kingman's Bluff, does nothing but hold him and comb her fingers through the dark mess of curls, feeling it dry and go warm at the scalp and cool toward the tips. 

The darkness grows lighter, the air warmer.

Confused by the sudden change in temperature, Willow looks up and her eyes widen. Around them is a bubble of gentle fluorescence, like a soap bubble made of light. Inside is gentle warmth and steady comfort, like the earth under their feet.

After the near-complete darkness during the deluge, the light feels foreign. Nevertheless, she's glad that when she untangles herself from him, she can see Xander now. 

"Do you trust me?" she asks eventually and looks back up so she can meet his eyes. It surprises her how steady her voice is.

He shouldn't trust her. With everything that happened in the past year, he should run screaming, she thinks. She should, too.

He doesn't. He opens his eyes and holds her gaze when he answers, "Always."

With her eyes stinging, Willow takes one more deep breath for courage and leans into him, rests her forehead against his. "Then trust me to know what's right for me. Just like I trust you to know what's right for you."

Xander doesn't move, doesn't even breathe and for a panicked second, Willow wonders if he'll refuse, but then she sees the smile smoothing out the frown lines on his face. It's a slow, knowing smile.

Around them, the light fades; the warmth sinks into her bones.

It feels too easy, somehow, but she'll be damned if she'll second-guess it. It's time to embrace absolution.

She embraces Xander instead and finds herself engulfed in the world’s most bone-crushing hug in return.

The moon peeks from behind a cloud.

***

"We're not kids anymore now, are we?" he asks her as they walk down from the Tor. It sounds melancholy.

"No, we're not."

He stops walking, raises his face toward the sky and takes a deep breath that sounds like a relieved sigh. Willow sees the moonlight reflect off his teeth when he smiles. "Good."

"Good?"

"Yeah. I can't wait to grow old with you. You know, two funny old people sitting on their porch in their rocking chairs, talking about their glory days with the Slayer."

"The porch of the house you built."

She can feel him beam next to her. "Yeah." He reaches for her hand in mid-stride. "Depends on whether or not they'll let me work here in England, of course. But I figure a good carpenter can find a job anywhere, right?"

Her heart feels too big for her chest suddenly. "Xander – "

"Couple of years down the road, who knows, maybe there'll be a demand for good old American handiwork over here."

"But you – "

He raises his index finger to silence her. "Yeah. But I realised something. Call it an epiphany. If I want you to love me as I am, then I have to do the same, right? I can't expect you to always be where I am. If you need to be here, then you should be here. And, you know, if a couple of years down the road the prophet won't come to the mountain …" He trails off into an awkward silence. "You know?"

Her heart feels ready to burst, and she doesn't know what to do with all the emotions, so she hugs him to her, hard enough to make him squeak. "I do."

"What do you say we get out of these wet clothes?" she asks into the wet wool of his jacket after a while. He smells of wet sheep, soap and something that's comfortingly warm Xander.

"Get naked and have hot, sweaty monkey sex back in the B&B?" he teases in a suggestive tone, tickling his fingers against her ribcage.

"Still several years too late and the wrong gender, sweetie," she laughs and squirms away from his hands. "What do you say to hot chocolate, pyjamas and fuzzy socks instead?" She offers her arm to him.

He links his arm with hers. "Perfect."

Fin


End file.
